living life through writing and song

excerpt

I’ve tried to be strong… but I just can’t go on. I can’t do it. I’m forgotten. God doesn’t know what He’s doing. Our country is falling apart, and here I am. Dying.

~ from Isolated

Hi, y’all! I’m so excited to be here participating in Jordy Leigh’s blog tour for Isolatedand to be able to share a spotlight or two from it with you!

Isolated (War and Wilderness, book one) is Jordy’s debut novella and the first in a series of four YA suspense novels about–you guessed it!–war and wilderness…and God.

Within fateful hours, she was homeless and an orphan.

Fourteen-year-old Louise Stella flees into the forest to escape an intruder who would take her hostage. But by the time she returns to her house, her country has broken out in war and her home island has become a military base. Sharing the land with enemy soldiers, Louise’s only goal is to stay alive one day at a time. Having no food or water, and little knowledge of how to survive in the forests of Quebec, her biggest adversary is “the Unknown”. Her pride crumbles and she realizes that she can’t sustain herself. She must depend on someone else… but Whom?

Isolated is a Young Adult suspense novella with uncertainty lurking at every turn. It will have you asking the big questions about life and death. Will you come to the same conclusion as Louise?

I had the privilege of being able to read the novella and choose the excerpt that I wanted to spotlight. It is an short but intense novella about survival, war, and, ultimately, our relationship with God as shown through Louise–which is what I want to shine the spotlight on. (Minor spoilers ahead.)

Louise’s family loves God, but she doesn’t understand who He is–and, more importantly, she doesn’t want to. She wants to live her life her own way and be in charge of her own fate.

God, it’s just that I… I hate not knowing things. I hate not knowing how tomorrow will work out or if I made the right choice.

Of course, throughout the novella, as she is forced to survive on her own and goes through many different struggles, there are many opportunities to humble herself.

Some strong feeling reared up in Louise. Hope was a part of it. So was adrenaline. But there was something else, too. Fear? Anger? Sorrow? The enemy base was also her home – the Bible school where she had grown up; her security. She wondered which building had been attacked. Perhaps it was the office or one of the student dormitories. But when she heard the shouts, she knew it had to be her house.

God…

She had no words.

But God doesn’t give up–He never gives up, and that is such a beautiful theme of this book–that God is always there for us, and He loves us more than we can know or possibly imagine.

Louise recalled the bracelets she often made on long road trips. She was proud of them. Is that how You feel about the stars? There was a brief pause, then she ventured another question. Is that how You feel about…me?

There were so many beautiful passages that I could share, words that affected me, that Jordy used to show me–and all of us–that God is there, and that we need Him. We need His love, and we need His power–always.

Also, make sure to check out Isolated‘s landing page as well as Jordy’s blog, where she authors both spiritual and writing-related posts! Jordy is a great friend and a lovely person to interact with–so leave a comment on her blog and tell her congrats! Also, if you’re interested in learning about her writing progress, make sure to join her newsletter group (link is on her blog).

From as young as seven years old, Jordy Leigh filled exercise booklets with stories until her hand hurt. She loves a good book, but ultimately she hopes that hers will offer something of greater value than short-lived entertainment. In reading them, may you learn more about the God of the Bible.

Jordy Leigh hopes that Isolated will at once quench your desire for compelling fiction and nourish your soul with wholesome truth.

let’s talk, shall we?

Are you excited for Isolated‘s publication? Have you read it/do you want to? Do you prefer novels or novellas? And make sure to head over to Jordy’s blog and congratulate her!

(P.S. I have missed you all and will hopefully write up a post talking about my absence and all of that stuff soon…)

Spotlights: excerpts, commentary, and random stuff about my current writing. Previous Spotlights can be found here.

If you remember the last Spotlight, I introduced to you a new story that I’ve been calling Iris but will probably be called something else (The Flower of Esclia?). Well, it was supposed to be a short story, but I have 17,000 words so far and it’s still not done.

So it’ll probably be more of a novelette/ novella.

Anyway, I told you about some characters last time, and today you get to meet a new one! His name is Samuel, and he’s quite fantastic. He’s the son of a travelling merchant and was Rosie’s and Iris’s childhood friend. He’s perceptive and…I don’t know how to describe him. You’ll have to read the excerpt.

Random updates on the current writing: The story keeps getting more complicated. Shippiness is at an all-time low between Garic and Iris, but don’t worry, it’ll get better. And I basically have no idea what I’m doing anymore, so I’m making it up as I go along.

All right, all right, I’ll give you the excerpt.

A few minutes later, Samuel sat down next to her and flicked the reins, starting the horses into an easy walk. “The prince is in the back…but he’s right, you know. It looks like it might snow.”

Iris tilted her head to the sky, blanketed with clouds so that neither stars nor moon could be seen. “Maybe.”

“So what’s this about Rosie?” asked Samuel.

This was not how she wanted him to find out. If anything, she didn’t want him to find out at all. Rosie would be better in his memories as free and unfettered, not crippled and locked away in her room. “Last time you and your father left…”

“Yes?”

“About a month later, there was an…an accident.”

Samuel turned to her, dark eyes filled with pain. “What happened?”

Iris took a deep breath. Better to get it over with quickly. “A carriage driver lost control and one of his horses nearly killed Rosie. She survived but…but she has no movement below her neck.”

He was breathing heavily, and she thought she could see the memories running through his mind. Their times together had always been filled with physical activities, with running wild through the streets in a race, or playing tug-of-war, or dancing in the lantern glow of the autumn festival.

That had been the last time Samuel had been there, and Rosie had practically glowed all through those two weeks. And at the end was the festival, where the musicians played and the people of Eyspar danced, and Samuel and Rosie had spent half the night together, spinning around each other and whispering and laughing.

Looking at him, Iris knew that was exactly the memory in his eyes.

“She’s pulled through, though,” she whispered. “You know Rosie…she can find happiness in every situation. I don’t know how she does it, but she does.”

Samuel didn’t answer for a long time, the silence filled by the wind in the grass and the quiet clopping of the horses’ hooves on the dirt road. Finally he spoke. “It’ll be warmer in the wagon. You should go inside.”

It was easy to tell that he wanted to be left alone, so Iris nodded, and he stopped the horses so that she could climb inside.

The wagon was cluttered with wares and barrels and a dim lantern hung in the corner, swaying, illuminating Garic in the only clear spot, leaning against the wall.

She sat down as far away from him as she could, which was only a few feet, and looked down at the ground.

“You’ve been crying,” said Garic.

Of course he’d notice the one thing that she was trying to hide. But what did it matter? It didn’t change the fact that Rosie was never going to stand or walk again. That she could never be who she was once before.

“We haven’t seen Samuel for over a year,” she whispered. “He didn’t know about—” Her voice broke. “About Rosie.”

Iris glanced up at Garic, bathed in warm lantern light, extending his arms to her.

Tonight, when the wind whistled sorrowfully and Samuel’s heart was breaking, she let herself go to him. Tonight he held her, and his solidity dampened the pain, made it bearable.

Tomorrow she would push him away again, tomorrow, but tonight…tonight she let her silent tears fall on him until she fell asleep.

lettuce talk (hahaha I’m so clever)

What do you think of the Spotlight/excerpt/Samuel/everything? Does the block quote format make the text too big? (I’m kind of thinking so.) If you could put the characters into any situation & observe their reactions, what would it be? And randomly, how are you today? What’s been the best part of your day/week?

I couldn’t find an iris, unfortunately…but this is a pretty flower too.

This Spotlight has been the most finicky one. I’ve written three full drafts of it, one about character voices in Enhanced, one about starting sentences when I was rewriting Enhanced, and one with snippets from the rewrite of Enhanced. But this post has nothing to do with Enhanced, so I’m crossing my fingers that it will work out. (Plus, the fourth time’s the charm, right?)

P.S. If you don’t know what a Spotlight is, the definition is “weekly hahhaha no excerpts, commentary, and random stuff about my writing”. Read my previous Spotlights here.

Anyway. The story.

I know I just talked last post about how I was starting a “new” writing project, The Blade. But you know those times when inspiration actually hits you? Yeah, you’ve just got to follow it. So I did.

Before I give you an excerpt (yay!), here’s some backstory & information on the short story, currently titled Iris.

A few years ago, one of my best friends and I wrote a novel called Eyes Closed, about…well, royalty, a throne, magic, and trust. One of the two main characters is a princess named Aleria, and this short story is a prequel about her parents’ story. (Because they die before the novel begins, we never get to know much about them.)

It’s probably actually going to end up being more of a novellette/novellainstead of a short story, which isn’t good for The Blade, but eh–this is more fun! (Pro tip: Always write whatever is most fun. It’ll definitely help you finish things.)

And here’s your regularly scheduled excerpt!

There’s so many to choose from! *has small crisis* Okay, here’s one that should work (a.k.a. it’s not very spoilery, it includes both Garic & Iris, and I also just really like it).

She led him up a flight of stairs and knocked on a door. “Rosie? Are you awake?”

A few moments later, the answer came. “Come in.”

“I brought you a visitor,” said Iris, and he found he loved the smile of anticipation on her face as she opened the door.

He stepped inside to find a girl lying in bed. Though she was pale and obviously sick, she looked much like Iris, and he couldn’t help but smile at her wide, blue eyes.

Iris was smiling so widely that she could have rivaled the brightness of the sun. “Rose, this is Prince Garic. Prince Garic, this is Rose.”

“You can call me Rosie,” said the girl in the bed, a little shyly.

“Rosie. You have a name fit for a princess.”

If saying kind things to Rosie would make Iris smile at him like that again, he thought he’d never tire of it.

“Have you seen my garden?” whispered Rosie, nodding her head toward the window.

He was about to reply that he hadn’t, when he saw the handkerchiefs hanging down. He crossed the room to them. Beautiful flowers were embroidered on each one of them, each a different kind. Pansies, carnations, lilies, and a rose… He fingered it, knowing it was the one that Iris had been working on when he was last here.

Warmth flooded him as he looked at the flowers, then back at the two sisters. “It’s the most beautiful garden I’ve ever seen,” he said quietly, his voice wavering just slightly. “It rivals the castle’s.”

Rosie’s smile was beautiful and innocent, but he found Iris’s even more entrancing. She motioned subtly to the chair by Rosie’s bedside, and he sat down in it, unsure of what to say.

Rosie spoke first. “What is your favorite flower?”

Garic was tempted to say an iris, but he was sure that would leave Iris’s eyes shooting daggers at him, so he refrained. “Peonies. The yellow ones.”

“Iris,” Rosie breathed, “will you embroider me a peony next?”

He couldn’t help but wish that her smile was bestowed on him rather than Rosie as she spoke. “Of course.”

what think ye?

Do you like the excerpt? What do you think of Garic and Iris (and Rosie, of course)? Do you want to know more? Did I finally do this Spotlight justice? How often should I do Spotlights? And what are you currently writing? I want excerpts & commentary & random stuff about it!

So you may have noticed that I disappeared from the blogosphere.

I mean, it was just a slight disappearance that took up, yeah, about the whole month of April. Eek.

And I know what you’re all wondering: Why did you leave us with no warning? We’ve all been suffering without your fabulous blog posts! Don’t leave us anymore!!

Or something of the sort.

Well, there wasn’t a huge reason why I disappeared…mainly just a culmination of lots of little things that led to me not posting and only commenting on a few blog posts throughout the month.

Here’s some of the reasons:

I totally failed Camp NaNo. I don’t know how this affected me, but about the time I stopped writing in my novel, I stopped checking my blog as much. I stopped writing because I got to a point where I didn’t know how to write anything I liked (which I’m still struggling with, a bit).

The post I was working on was taking a long time to put together. Like, it was taking longer than my Dares posts do! It’ll still be coming to you, at some point, but I’m only about halfway through it at the moment. (For a sneak peek, it’s about positivity!)

Life was busy. Between school nearing the end of the year, choir festival, composing a choral song, reading lots of books, and procrastinating a lot, there just wasn’t any time. (Okay, I had some time. But not a lot.)

And…yep. I’m sorry for leaving youwithout your favorite blog.

But I’m back now, and hopefully for quite a while as well!

And now for more exciting things… I’m working on a new writing project!

Well, “new” might not be the correct terminology. I actually started this project two years ago, during April Camp NaNoWriMo, so it’s actually quite old. But I haven’t worked on it for a very long time, so right now I want to finish it! (Remember, one of my New Year’s Resolutions was to finish writing three novels.)

It’s called The Blade (or, at least, that’s what it’s called for now), and despite there being a lot of fighting and war and stuff like that, it’s really about the internal struggles of a girl named Riven, trying to figure out who she is.

It also involves:

A sword-fighting teacher who doubles as an counselor

A boy with a crooked smile and great letter-writing skills

A sash

A loyal horse (or two)

A desert-y setting with canyons and red rocks

A mysterious man in black (yep, like Princess Bride)

A magic-less fantasy

A war

And a lot of heartbreak

And I know you’re dying for an excerpt now, so I tried to find something non-spoiler-y but still something I loved. So here’s this:

“Sometimes Malik sings to me when I can’t fall asleep,” said James, leaning up against the rock.

I stared. This Malik was sounding stranger and stranger. What sort of man would sing a little boy a lullaby to help him sleep? Well, perhaps the same kind who would take a whiplash for him. The kind of man who would love…so why would he be with the Bleeding Sun? “He sings to you?”

James nodded.

“What does he sing?”

“I can’t really remember all of it,” he said softly, a faint blush of embarrassment rising to his cheeks. Perhaps he didn’t want to have me intrude on this memory. Or maybe he just didn’t like singing.

“What’s the song about?”

James drew his finger through the red sand for a few moments before answering. “It’s about falling asleep and dreaming of a castle, and a princess.”

talk to me!

Did you miss me terribly? (Actually, don’t answer that, I know you did.) Did you write any awesome posts that I didn’t read/comment on & should? What was the best/worst part of April for you? How did Camp NaNo go for you? You must tell me everything I missed! And what do you think of my new project? Are you excited to learn more about it?

You shall behold that there was great sarcasm in that last sentence. Although, I will only be including my favorite excerpts, so maybe there will be some fabulous bits in there…we’ll see.

So, quick review if you weren’t around, since I still haven’t made a page for Battle Song yet: Little Mermaid retelling where she trades her beauty instead of her voice, is trying to get an immortal soul, is fabulous at fighting, and there are two adorable princes. Got it?

Great. Let’s get to the excerpts, then! Just be forewarned that they may be random and confusing…

“Have you seen the beauty of the ocean? Have you seen the rippling of the sand and the swaying of the seaweed? Have you seen the fish swimming past you in schools, close enough to touch? Have you seen the light streaming through the water and the bubbling of the currents? Have you seen the deep blue that grows so dark light cannot penetrate? These are sights that no human has ever seen. We come here to experience the beauty for a short time, even if it ends sooner than not.”

She [Alavar] bit her lip. I knew it even though I couldn’t see, because that’s what she did whenever she was worried about something. “There was a battle, and you were gone.”

“I…why did we attack them?”

“We didn’t. They attacked us.”

My heart froze as I thought of the implications. “But there wasn’t a storm.”

“That doesn’t matter anymore. Now all that matters is keeping us safe, which means staying together. We needed you there—Tarisah got hurt, badly.”

“Where is she?” I was suddenly frantic. Tarisah, my sister, hurt. I had to find her, had to apologize for not being there, for not protecting her. She was the third youngest, but she’d always been smaller than either I or Kariven. Always the weakest, always the one who needed to be protected, and I hadn’t been there to fight the other mers off.

“That’s not fair,” I said, as I followed Alavar out of the hut and into the blackened ocean. “They’re not supposed to do that. They’re not allowed to.”

She laughed softly, derisively. “You think that matters to them? Now, it doesn’t matter. We’ll have to be on the watch all the time, night and day, on all sides, waiting for attacks from anyone. You think our clan will survive? No. Not us. We lost all power and authority the day Mother died.”

“No, Alavar, you don’t get it. You don’t understand. You think I’m like you–you think I’m like everyone else! I try to be, but it just doesn’t work. I fooled you, but I can never fool myself. I hate fighting. I want to explore. I want to try new things. But you all expect me to be the same and I’m just not!”

She swam back from me slightly, as if my words had physically pushed her away. “What are you talking about?”

“I hate fighting. I never liked it. But I did it because everyone expected me to. I did it because it felt like my only option. And now, my only option is to stay here and be sentry because maybe then someone will trust me again and think I’m a normal mer instead of who I actually am.”

She didn’t say anything, so I kept talking. “You want to know why I spent so much time practicing how to fight? I did it because that’s what Mother and I always fought about. Maybe I thought that learning how to be a warrior would bring her back, but it never worked because she’s just seafoam and I’ll never get to see her again and tell her—” My voice broke suddenly, clogged up so much that I couldn’t speak. “Tell her how sorry I am.”

“She will share her magic with you, but for an exorbitant price, far more than one wants to pay. But she teases it out of you, hiding everything she can with half-truths. She’ll tell you she’s mended her ways, she’ll say that she only wants the best for you, but what she really wants is the best from you. It’s said she’ll steal your tail from you if you’re not paying attention.

“Down in the darkness of the deepness of the ocean she dwells, waiting for any unwary sea creature to come her way, into her grasp. Some are lured in by visionary sights; others choose to bargain. Only those who come knowing what they want manage to leave again at all, but you can never really escape.”

Her [the sea witch’s] voice became soft now, rippling through the water like how the wind caused ridges in the water and the sand. “I know what you want, Amrya, more than you do. I can see into you, to your deepest desire, the reason why you came here. Do you want to know why you are here?”

My heart was already broken; I had no idea why I would have come, so I uttered an emotionless “Yes.”

“You are here because you want to be human. You are here because you have to cling to something and that something is a soul. You want to last longer. Haven’t you thought to yourself that you wanted to be human? When Alavar laughed at that, you wanted to show her that she was wrong. She is, Amrya. There is more beauty up there that you will never see if you stay here your entire life, and all of it will last so much longer. There is no sea up there to decay the houses, nothing to wash away all the life you have known. The human world is so much more permanent than ours, and that is why you want to go.”

After I’d exhausted my spears for the fifth or sixth round, I went to go pick them up. I bent to grab one, and when I stood up, a man was standing there, holding out two of the spears I’d thrown to me. I squinted at him, at the light blond hair, the plain clothing, and then I remembered where I’d seen him before: talking to the prince on the riverbank the day of the fireworks.

“Thank you,” I said, after staring at him for a moment, and took the spears into my arms.

“What’s your name?” he asked, a glint of surprise in his blue eyes…blue just like Alavar’s.

“Amrya,” I replied, picking another spear off the ground, and waited for him to respond with his name, but he never did. Instead he grabbed the last spear, handed it to me, and walked back the thirty-or-so paces to where I had been throwing with me.

“Where did you learn to use a spear like that?” he asked.

I wasn’t sure how to answer. The way he asked it implied that this wasn’t how he normally saw spears being used…either that, or he thought it was impressive and also rare. Either way, saying anything specific might give something odd away. “My mother taught me.”

He looked at me even more oddly than before. “Your mother? So do all the women in your family do it?”

I nodded. “I have five older sisters.”

He looked at me in surprise again, and I wondered if he would ever look at me normally. “And they all can throw spears like that?”

I shrugged. “More or less.”

“What are your plans, then, for your future?” he [the king] pressed.

Before I had time to even think about answering, Aeren put his glass down on the table, a little harder than necessary. “Amrya has just been in a shipwreck that took the lives of her loved ones. Do you expect her to have an immediate plan for her future? She’ll figure everything out, I’m sure, but she needs time, not more stress than she already has.”

“Calm down, Aeren,” said the queen. “We’ll talk about this after dinner.”

Aeren still looked angry with his parents, but his spine, which had stiffened during his outburst, relaxed slightly.

I judged the situation cautiously. I was supposed to be nice to him [Rhys], to try to get him to fall in love with me, but I couldn’t help be a little bit annoyed with him. “You enjoyed that, didn’t you?”

“What?”

“Playing with them. Lying to them.”

He raised an eyebrow and looked at me coolly. “I’m not the one who should be talking about lying.”

I looked away, at the dancing, but I didn’t really focus in on it. “What did you tell Aeren?”

“Why does it matter to you whether he believes you or not? I thought I was the one you were trying to impress. You’re just like all those other girls. You only want the crown prince in order for my money, or worse, to become queen. Or, alternately, you could be a spy from Althair who merely heard about the story of the mysterious girl who saved me from the ship.”

“I’m not a spy, and I’m not like the other girls.” I looked at him levelly and gathered the courage I had. “I told you the truth when I said I was the one who saved you. The only reason I told Aeren differently is because you didn’t believe me, so I knew he wouldn’t.”

Rhys returned the same gaze. “I don’t know whether I should trust you or not.”

We walked in silence for a long moment, both of us looking out at the ocean and the sunset as the light died and drifted into darkness. The palace glowed with faint, yellow light, and we headed toward it. “When are you planning to go back to Althair?” asked Aeren suddenly.

“I do not know yet. I’m not sure. I’m afraid that I won’t be able to go back.” No, I knew that. I was a human now, forever, and there wasn’t a way to go back. Either I would stay a human into the eternities, or I would turn into seafoam as soon as Rhys was married.

“You can stay as long as you need, of course. But my father is already impatient…he wants to know why you’re here. He thinks you’re a spy for Althair. A girl just happens to show up at the brink of war, claiming to be shipwrecked, just happening to be taken in by the royal family…he thinks it’s too much of a coincidence to be a coincidence.” He looked at me and his eyes met mine. “You’re not a spy, are you?”

“No. I’m not a spy.” I might have lied about where I came from, but I was not a spy from Althair. It would have been a simple plan, though, had it been so.

“But if war did break out…you would be an Althairian in Sannave. My father doesn’t think that safe, especially because of your training in the spear.” His voice was unsure, and I could tell in his eyes that he wanted me to confirm.

“My heart lies in the ocean,” I whispered. “I have no desire to fight anyone.”

“I believe you.”

Alavar’s voice was more bitter than I’d expected. “Is it everything you’d imagined? Did you find what you were looking for, away from your family?”

“Not yet,” I said quietly, not wanting to confront her, not when I could still preserve our relationship. I didn’t want to lose her like I had Mother.

I reached out a hand, as if to hold hers, but she wouldn’t come any closer to shore. “I’m sorry, Alavar,” I said. “I really am.”

“If you were sorry, you wouldn’t have ever gone. You would have stayed with us, and this wouldn’t have happened.” She motioned to the stormy ocean, the clouds above that were threatening rain. “It’s chaos down there, Amrya. I don’t know what’s happening. I escaped here because this was the only place I could think of to go. I don’t know where anyone is or even if everyone is alive. The war began and there was singing, but so much of it. As if all the clans were singing, all of them are fighting now. I don’t know if it’ll ever die down, but I can’t find anyone.”

“Alavar…” I whispered, too shocked to say anything else. My breath was caught in my throat. It was hard to think, hard to think about what it was like down there in the darkness. “No.”

“You would’ve been able to fight them off. You would have saved us, at least kept us together. You could have made everything all right, but you weren’t there.” Her tone was as biting as the rain that had just started, splattering against me in tiny drops that stung against my skin. I was already wet, so I bent down and knelt in the water, where I could reach out and just touch the tips of Alavar’s fingers when she reached out her hand.

“I’m so sorry,” I said, and tears rolled down my cheeks just as the rain did. “I don’t know what to do.”

“There’s nothing you can do. You just stay there and try to get your prince to fall in love with you so that you can stay human forever. I…I don’t even know why I came.”

“Because you miss me?” It was more a question than a statement, one that I needed confirmation to.

I thought I saw tears in her eyes. “Because I miss you.”

Can you see why I love this novel so much? Okay, maybe you can’t. I mean, I didn’t even include any of the shippy parts with Aeren and Amrya and the fruit. (Which is great.) But even though I can’t say that all of it is that well-written (these are the best I could find), I love my characters and my plot so much, and maybe in this Spotlight you got to see a tiny piece of that.

Yes, for all of you who didn’t realize, I disappeared from my blog again for about two weeks this time. Why? Well, I was procrastinating a lot on the Internet and I also didn’t feel like I was spending enough time with my family, so I chose to basically not go on the Internet for a week, and it was actually really nice. I did spend more time with my family but most of my time was actually spent at band camp for marching band.

HOWEVER I am back now and here to share my second Spotlight with you! Earlier today I was reading the first 40K I’d written of Cryonic during April for Camp NaNo (and it is surprisingly better written than I had thought) and there was one chapter that really stuck out to me.

Some of you may know that at one point I decided to have 6 POV characters in Enhanced, so I added in a character who hadn’t been in the first draft, but then I took him out again about a month later. His name is Zen, and he’s an awesome character but he didn’t really fit with any part of the plot, so I decided that maybe he’d just be a minor character in one of the later books or something.

But reading over this chapter that I wrote, I had the idea that I could give Zen his own novel, and I think I would enjoy it. But I shall stop rambling now and actually share the chapter with you so you can see what it’s like and decide if you would want to read more. (If not, that’s totally fine, haha. It’s a) a rough draft, and b) my style is definitely not everyone else’s style. I like honest feedback.)

Disclaimers: The chapter takes place during a war, a very bloody war. So there is a lot of death and dying and killing and blood. It’s not necessarily gory since I didn’t really go into description of gory things, but it is war, and it’s meant to be kind of horrific and emotional and dark. It’s fine for most people, I think. Also, it’s almost 3000 words, so it’s…really long. I won’t be offended if you don’t read it all. 😉

“Get under cover!” Zen yelled to his team, ducking behind one of the makeshift walls as bullets whizzed past him, soundless to the silencers in his ear that simultaneously allowed him to communicate with those in his team.

The answers came back through the silencers and around him, he saw the members of his team. Adrenaline pumped through him, mixed with determination. “We’ll stay here for another minute, and then charge forward. I’ve just received word that they’ve damaged the outer wall of the city enough for some people to get in just to the north of here. We’ll charge past the other line of men and jump through the walls, take cover, and wait for more orders.”

The others nodded, and in that moment, he knew how exhausted they all were. They’d been assaulting the city for days now, and in the blazing heat they were all getting tired and dehydrated. He took the water bottle out of his suit and drank some of the warm liquid, the rest of his team following suit.

“Ready…” They stood at attention. “Go!” Moving together, they clambered up over the wall, Zen in the front, firing their guns at the enemy line, just waiting for a bullet to puncture into them. They had been given bulletproof armor, but it didn’t cover everything in order to allow mobility, and there was always the chance that one would die, especially the more battles one went through.

And Zen had been through quite a lot.

The enemy fired back and he ran as fast as he could, relying on his strengthened muscles and days of long training to increase his speed enough to run past, enemies falling, spraying red blood. Zen felt a few bullets hit with a slight pressure on his bulletproof suit, and each one made him wonder if this would be the last run he made, the last breath he took.

Some part of him just wanted to stop, to let the screaming bullets take him, but he never did. He kept fighting not because he believed it was right, but because he couldn’t let his friends around him down.

Especially not Lian. This was his first battle, and he was under Zen’s command. That was enough to make him run like the wind.

They reached the wall, a gaping gash of a hole bombed through it, like an open sore, rubble surrounding it like blood. Zen covered for the rest of his team as they climbed through the hole, jumping from pieces of rock in order to make their way through it. He counted them off as they came through, all of them there. After they were all in, Zen followed, bullets pounding against the bulletproof vest. How long would it be until the vest fell to pieces from the battering? He knew they could last for a long time…but how long?

The sight that met him inside the city walls caught him off guard, even as his body continued the motion and ducked behind the side of a house with the rest of his team. No military met them, no one fired back. Bloody, wounded bodies were left on the ground from the bombing of the wall, but as he peered out at them, he noted that they wore no uniform.

Civilian bodies.

The twisting in his gut began, the same horrific feeling that had come over him at the last battle, when he’d seen a similar sight. Surely they would have evacuated the people closer to the inside of the city? But…they hadn’t. Why?

“What next, Zen?” Barro asked, and Zen turned to face him, swallowing slightly. He had orders…but those orders were for a military base, not a civilian compound.

Was it time to disobey? No, not yet, he couldn’t let them know yet that the disapproved, but he couldn’t kill innocents either. This conversation was probably being recorded…they might be able to find out what he said next. He searched for a solution, one finally coming from his mind. “They must have bombed the wrong part of the wall…we’re supposed to be in a military base, but those are civilians. For now, we wait here for further orders. Everyone alright?”

Zen took a glance over his men, and found Lian a little ways away, trembling, his whole body shaking like a leaf as he stared with wide eyes at the bodies.

Walking forward, Zen moved toward him and put his hand on the boy’s shoulder. He seemed to calm slightly at the touch, but the terror was still in his eyes. “Lian,” he whispered, “I know it’s hard to look at. I know that sick feeling you get when you look at them. But there’s nothing we can do about it now.”

Lian coughed and sniffled, the sound clearly audible with the silencers stopping every other sound. “We should have been able to do something.” His voice was shaky and weak, and Zen wondered again how Lian had managed to convince the military leaders he was trained and fit for apprenticeship into the war.

He squeezed his shoulder, opened his mouth, and then closed it again. He couldn’t say much with them listening in to him, couldn’t give the kind of comfort that he wanted to. He didn’t really know what to say, then. War was all he remembered, the killing was all he knew. And civilians…they’d been nothing to him before. But after Lian had been assigned to him, he’d started to feel again. Not to remember, but to feel.

Sickening, that’s what every battle felt like after the adrenaline was gone and the stark reality was there, staring up at you with empty, dead eyes.

“Come back here, Lian,” he said quietly. “It’s better if you don’t look.”

The boy let him lead him away without any argument, and as he turned, Zen caught a glimpse of movement in the empty space left of the hole.

Reflexes took over. Zen pushed Lian away and whipped out his gun, firing at the movement.

Silence.

“Zen?” Araena’s voice was quiet, worried, tense.

“It might have been nothing,” he said, relaxing slightly. “I thought I saw something, but it was probably just my imagination.” I’m seeing things… It was hard to tell if it was real or not. There could be enemy soldiers out there trying to get a shot at them…or it could be something else. His memories? He’d thought he’d seen flickers of it, like visions appearing in his mind before, melding themselves with his surroundings. Had he seen that flash of motion once before?

Or, of course, he could just be going crazy.

“We’d better keep an eye on that opening. Teika, Vessen, Elko, stay here and watch. The rest of us are going to scout around just a little bit, in case there’s any soldiers here.”

The idea had come to his mind after the motion there, as gruesome as it was. Could the enemy really have placed civilians in the place they knew the bomb would hit in order to distract invaders afterward enough to ambush them? That was even more sickening, but it somehow fit. No civilian would stray near city walls knowing that they were being attacked.

Zen made sure to take Lian in his group when they split around buildings, wanting to keep an eye on him. He didn’t remember his first battle, and the blank spot frustrated him to no end, but he was sure it must have been as horrible as this.

What would it be like to be like Lian had been before he’d come here? Not knowing about death, not understanding that life could be so easily taken. The boy valued life so much more than Zen did, and part of him envied that, wanted to feel an ache at every life he took away, to make sure he really knew what he was doing, but the other part of him was grateful that he didn’t understand it fully, that he didn’t remember what life was like before.

He jerked back into the moment, looking through the scope of his gun. In the distance, he could see movement. Pointing toward it, they headed that way, and as they came closer, he saw it was a woman, holding onto the lifeless form of a body, head bowed over him, hair covering her face.

Quietly, they moved toward her. The others followed him around a house — he didn’t want to frighten her into running — but when they came back out again, she was gone. There wasn’t even a body there, just…nothing.

He was definitely seeing things, and it made his head hurt. Was he going crazy? Or, were they, as Lian had suggested, visions of memories that were now slipping into his mind when it related to the situation?

It was true; there was something familiar about the things he saw, unless he was just imagining that part, but whenever he tried to actually remember anything, he wasn’t able to reach past his memories of a few years ago, except for the occasional whisper of something tickling in the back of his mind.

“This way,” said Zen, leading them through the buildings and trying to focus on what was at hand. The past was a long ways away, and the present was now. He couldn’t afford to spend his time looking backward. “You seeing anything?”

His team answered with negatives, and he nodded, weaving through the buildings. Maybe he shouldn’t have taken Lian with him — there was a body in nearly any direction you looked, and many of them had been shredded by scrapnel. This wasn’t any place for a boy…and yet something in him said that’s what a war was, to turn a boy into a man.

But was a man someone who saw death and felt nothing or saw it and wanted to weep for the life that had been lost?

Focus. He was having trouble with that today, and it wasn’t a good mindset to be in when they were in the middle of a war.

A war with what? Civilians, innocents?

His spinning thoughts were focused a second later, when he heard a voice crackling through the silencers. Teika’s voice, worried and fast. “Zen, we’ve got a problem.” Silence for a few seconds, as Zen turned and started running toward them. Then, “They’re swarming through, like rats. Can’t keep them away for long.”

“Hold on as long as you can. We’re coming for you. Keep me updated.”

As he ran, all the worst scenarios that could happen ran through his head as he imagined what had happened. The flash of movement, then, had been real, and he hadn’t been seeing things that time. They’d been lying in wait, and he’d misjudged. He’d taken most of the group, and then the ambush had happened from the wrong side.

Zen cursed over and over again, making sure none if it was going through the silencers to his men. If they knew how worried he was, they would be too; it was the simple rule of battle psychology. Act confident, be confident, and your men will accept it as truth.

Teika’s voice came through the line again, this time strained. “Been shot…in the leg…hurry.”

Zen affirmed that they were coming and then cursed again. This wasn’t supposed to be going like this.

And then another thought came into his mind: if Teika had been shot and she was still the only one who had contacted them, what was happening to Vessen and Elko?

Zen wanted to comfort the others on his team, to tell them fake assurances, but he couldn’t think of anything to say. So there was silence as they ran, settling over them, deep and heavy, like a thick cloud of smoke.

When they came across the gaping hole in the wall, his mouth went dry. The enemy soldiers were pouring in still, covering the hole, as Teika had said, like rats. Zen fired a spray of bullets at them, and a few went down, but not enough.

He found the three of his soldiers holed up in an alleyway — at least they’d retreated to a semi-defensible system, rather than staying out in the open. That gave him some hope, but it was quickly discouraged as they charged over to them. Teika was barely standing, leaning against the wall for support, and Elko was barely able to fire his gun from where he sat near the wall, clutching at a wound on his side, maybe at one of the straps where the bulletproof suits came together. Vessen was unconscious behind them, not even moving.

Zen was filled with such a rage that he’d never felt before. If he hadn’t been able to feel sorrow before, he’d never felt this either. It rose up in him like a raging fire, unable to be stopped, like lightning being flung across a stormy sky.

And for the first time since he’d started to feel, he wanted to kill.

The shots from his gun blazed into their men, pushing them down where they fell. He felt returning bullets slamming against him, but he ignored it, focusing solely on making them bleed as much as possible.

How dare they touch his men, how dare they shoot them, how dare they attack them defenseless when they knew their leader was gone?

They were monsters, and each one he killed seemed like a mercy.

But no matter how many of them he shot, they just kept coming, swarming toward them, filling up the area before the alleyway, as if they were waiting for their chance to die. As if they were sacrificing in order to try to get at least one good shot in.

And they did. Zen watched as his men started to get shot, one by one, thankfully not in the most vital of places it seemed, but they left and the enemy kept coming.

Each one made him shoot more. When he ran out of bullets, he tossed his gun back to Teika, who refilled it as he grabbed the gun Vessen had dropped, exploding more of the others, killing them, pushing them away as best that he could.

The fight seemed to last ages as they came and came, pooling around them like blood. No, like carnivores, ready to consume their prey. It seemed that everyone was wounded except for him when others on their side finally came, enough of them to make a difference, enough of them to make a rescue.

Zen watched all of it with glazed eyes, as they took the gun from his hands and the rage kept on inside of him but his body was so tired his arms simply held limply at his sides, waiting.

He finally came to his senses when one of them started taking the pulses of his wounded men. “What are you doing?” he asked, stepping over to him, feeling weak on his feet.

“Making sure they’re alive,” the man snapped back, his words sharp and abrupt, pounding into Zen’s skull. Had he really talked like that before he’d met Lian?

Zen swallowed as he moved to each of them, his heart sinking as he moved toward Teika, Vessen, and Elko, the three that had first been here. He wanted, with all his heart, to believe that they were alive, but the stark reality was that they’d been wounded for longer than anyone else.

When the man checked Vessen’s pulse, his fingers came away with bloodstains.

“Dead.”

Zen’s stomach plummeted, and his whole body seemed to cry out in pain. Not Vessen, not the strong and noble man who would have given anything for the rest of them, hiding it behind grumbles that any person could see through.

In war, though, there could only be acceptance, not denial. It didn’t change anything. Vessen was dead no matter what he did.

Lian came to stand next to him, putting his hand on his arm. When Zen turned to look at him, there were tears in the boy’s eyes, but he was the one who did the comforting. “You did everything you could. You’re not responsible.”

Zen wanted to pretend to be strong, to say, “What makes you think I’m sorry?” but he couldn’t. He only shook his head.

Lian kept talking. “This is war. People…people die. That’s what they say. I calculated the statistics of someone dying today and the chances were high that one of us would suffer a fatality, so I tried to expect it.” His voice choked up. “Vessen isn’t just a number, though.”

“Wasn’t,” Zen whispered. He didn’t know what to say, what to think. “I haven’t lost a man since…since Fyn.”

Lian tensed beside him; Fyn had been closer in age to him than any other. Zen half expected him to start spouting some sort of statistics, since he seemed to do that when he tried to comfort, but he didn’t speak.

Neither of them did, standing there in the alleyway as it was slowly emptied of their wounded friends. Finally Zen just started walking, and Lian followed, the two of them moving out of the city.

It was hard not to step on any of the bodies.

If you managed to read through all of that, what did you think? Did you like or not like? Are you curious about Zen? I am. I haven’t figured out half his secrets yet. Did it make you feel emotion in any way? And, most important of all, are you excited to see me back in the blogosphere again? 😀

First things first: Brie is not cheese, she is a character from Enhanced.

Second things second: What is this “Spotlight” you speak of? you may be asking. Well, I’ll explain it to you. During the week or two I’ve been gone from the blogosphere did you notice? I was (as well as procrastinating from Camp NaNo) thinking a bit about how to improve my blogging. And I decided I wanted to share more writing with you more often, but I can’t exactly write a short story every week. Then I thought of writing a novel solely on this blog, which would be fun, but I have no ideas, let alone motivation to actually do it.

So I came up with the idea of the Spotlight. Basically, weekly I will “shine the spotlight” on some of the writing I worked on that week, which will probably include excerpts of some of my favorite parts, anything that I really enjoyed writing, cool descriptions, thoughts, etc. Basically anything that I feel really struck me gets to be posted here!

That means that not only will you get to read more of my writing through excerpts, you’ll also get to know my characters a lot better and get a feel for my novel. Are you in? I hope so!

FIRST DRAFT BRIE

I was reading through my first draft of Enhanced the other day, and found myself thinking about Brie. She is…an interesting character.

Fun Fact: Taira, Will, and Brie all came from a short piece I wrote for an informal writing contest:

Taira took a step. That one step, into the new world, the world they had saved. Will and Brie walked after her, looking about themselves in awe. “We did it,” whispered Will. “We did it.” Brie nodded along, eyes full of wonder.

Taira couldn’t understand them. The world was too empty. There were buildings just down the road from them, with flashing lights and glowing signs, but it was still so empty. She finally realized why — the world had been silenced. There were no people driving cars along the roads. There was no music to be heard. There was no sound of jets flying over them. Everything was totally silent. The only thing that made a noise was the wind blowing the dirt around them, dirt devoid of any sort of life.

She felt like she was in a dream as she walked along with the others, into that maze of buildings. Empty buildings. A soft sound filled the air, a sound Taira wanted to run away from, to never have to listen to again. The sound of sobbing, the sound of pure sorrow, the sound of the worst pain in the world. They didn’t go down that road.

As they walked, they saw no movement until they came upon a little girl, kneeling in front of someone, shaking him. “Daddy, Daddy, wake up!” she said, as if not knowing that he was gone and would never come back.

The little girl looked up as they walked past, and Taira saw her wide eyes staring up at them, clouded with confusion. Taira wanted to go to her, to comfort her, to do something, but Will and Brie held her back. “You can’t do anything about it,” said Brie.

Taira pushed herself away from them, away from everyone, her eyes welling with tears as she ran down the empty streets, finally collapsing under a large tree. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. It had never been meant to be like this.

The plague had spread over the whole world, infecting almost everyone, with almost unnoticeable symptoms that led quickly to a sickness that was more painful than death. It spread easily, and only few people in the world had been able to resist it.

The only cure was death.

The only way to restore the world was to cleanse it from the disease, to purge it of all of the remaining plague. To kill everyone who’d contracted it.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. It wasn’t supposed to include pain and anguish. It was supposed to take that away, not leave children parentless and parents widowed and people with no one left in the world to care for them.

The tears streamed down Taira’s cheeks and her throat choked as she whispered a prayer, as if someone, somewhere could give her comfort. Those lives shouldn’t have been lost. Life was too precious to be cut short like that, in an instant.

They had saved the world, but had they destroyed it in the process?

Of course, Enhanced is much, much different than this excerpt. Nothing in this happens that does in Enhanced, but it was still the inspiration for those three characters (though you may notice that this Taira is much different than the one in her character interview, who is more of the actual Taira).

I don’t know where Brie really came from besides that, but for some reason, I decided that she was going to be really, really emotional. And kind of childish. And in a way, just relaly weird… I don’t know why, though.

There was a banging sound on the other side of his door, and Kai cautiously stood up and

opened it. Will stood on the other side of the door, looking relieved and also disheveled. “Taira’s missing,” he said.

“What?” he asked, the worry on Will’s face putting him on high alert. “What are you talking about, she’s missing?”

“She’s not here, and there’s this crazy girl in my room, and I have no idea—”

Kai held up a hand. “Hold up, just wait a minute and start from the beginning. What exactly happened?”

“Well, I was going back to my room, and when I came in, there was this girl sitting there on my bed, looking through all my gadgets and stuff. And then she said that she was Seth’s sister and she talked to Taira about something about getting a job here, but that Taira was supposed to come back before I did, and she’s still not here.”

“Seth’s sister?” asked Kai. “Brie?”

Will’s face registered surprise. “How did you know that?”

“I met her once a while ago.”

“And you remember her?” Then he shook his head. “I guess when it’s someone with a crazy personality like that, they’re hard to forget.”

*facepalms at self repeatedly*

Perhaps because of this…this awkwardness, though she did play a part in the beginning of the book, Brie kind of disappeared near the middle. But what I had forgotten was that I brought her back at the end of the book, and…she’s really more amazing than I had thought before.

There’s this part where I really, really love what she says:

Then Brie straightened and thrust herself out of his grasp. He reached out to grab her, but she was too far away already. But instead of heading toward where Jethro was, like he expected, she ran to Seth’s bedside, talking furiously and quietly to the figure there.

Kai began to walk toward her, as his inspiration said, and soon he could hear her softly-spoken words. “What do I do, Seth? Tell me what to do?”

Seth’s words were weary. “Stop fighting. No one can save us now.”

“No, I won’t leave you.” She leaned even closer next to her brother’s head where it lay on his pillow. “I won’t stop fighting. I’ll never stop. Have hope, Seth, please, have hope.”

“Brie…” he said faintly, “all of my hope died a long time ago.”

That second-to-last paragraph…I just love it. I won’t stop fighting. I’ll never stop. It just made me fall in love with her a little, and I had a lot of fun today developing her for the rewrite of Enhanced. Even though she’s still not a POV character, I am hoping to make her a little more major in the rewrite, and also more of the person she is in this last excerpt.

Also, I decided that Brie loves to sing! She’s really awesome…and I think that concludes our Spotlight for this week. Any thoughts on this Spotlight or Spotlights as a whole? Oh and one more thing for all you Miraculous fans out there: I was looking up what type of cheese brie was and apparently it’s similar to Camembert (but more mild). I suppose Plagg would like her.

I haven’t written an advice-y post in ages. So I decided to write one on something I feel is very important–giving good critique. Critique is actually one of the most helpful things in the world, and being able to accept critique and constructive criticism is a good quality to have.

But also important is to be able to give critique to other people in a way that encourages and motivates them, while still being useful. In the example of sharing a piece of writing, though saying “OHMYGOSH I LOVED IT!!!!” does give a little thrill of happiness to the author, it doesn’t help them improve much. Likewise, being told, “I liked it, but this and this and this and this could have been done better,” is just discouraging.

So let’s find a happy medium: the Oreo Method. Now, I actually heard this called a peanut butter & jelly sandwich, but I decided that I’d apply it to writing using Oreos instead, because I like those better. Yum yum yum.

So, what is the Oreo Method? Well, it goes like this:

Essentially, the idea is to sandwich the constructive criticism inside of constructive flailing over awesomeness. Which may sound like we’re trying to hide the parts that weren’t so good–but we’re not! The inside of the oreo is just as delicious as the outside, which brings me to another point.

The funny thing is that telling about the awesome parts can be just as useful as telling about the potential-for-awesomeness parts, if you do it right. If you say, “I loved it all it was just like a real book!” that’s not as helpful as something like, “I loved the way you described the setting in this paragraph because it felt really vivid, like I was actually there.” Telling people where and what the good parts are is just as helpful as telling them where they could improve.

Should we do an example now? I’m feeling like it’s time to do an example. This is an excerpt from a book I started writing last April, tentatively titled The Blade. I chose it since I think there are a number of things that are both good and can be improved. Let’s look at it:

Sometimes I wished I wasn’t the Blade, that I could be just a normal girl with a normal life sewing and cooking and whatever else normal girls did. But whenever I thought of that, I remembered what Efron had told me that day.

Everyone knew he was growing older, the gray starting to show in his thinning hair, and without a heir, they all wanted him to choose a new Blade. They lined up rows of their young boys, trying to impress him.

I’d watched from my perch in a tree as the man I knew only as the Blade then inspected each of the boys, every one of them standing perfectly still. The process was boring, but there was something about the Blade that interested me. The way he moved, the way he spoke…everything about him was powerful and strong.

As Efron neared the end of the row of the boys, everyone watching shifted uncomfortably. How long would it take him to choose the next Blade? They’d been through thousands of boys already from all over Scronna, traveling miles for their own chance. The Blade passed by every single one of them.

At the end of the line, he shook his head. Angry murmurs ran through the crowd. Why didn’t he just choose the next one already? Why didn’t he do what needed to be done? He was a fool to keep not choosing anyone. Soon, there would be no boys left.

I scrambled out of the tree, hoping to catch a better glimpse of the Blade through the crowd. In my trousers and tunic, I probably looked more like a boy than a girl, aside from the two braids of hair that ran down my back.

Falling in step next to him, I felt like I had accomplished everything. I had something to boast over any other child ­–I’d walked right next to the Blade. And now I would talk to him. “Hello, Blade.”

“Efron,” he corrected, then glanced down at me. “Who are you?”

“My name’s Riven, if that’s what you’re asking,” I said. “How come you aren’t choosing any of those boys to be the next Blade?”

He glanced back at the boys who were now struggling to find their parents in the crowd. “None of them fit the qualifications for being the Blade. You have to be something extra special to be it. And these boys, they’re all the same. They’ve all been trained the same way. They’ll all become Knives, and some may become Rapiers. The Blade needs someone different than that.”

“Like what?” I asked, not really sure where he was walking to, but content to follow him anyway. I had nowhere better to be.

“I need someone who’s different. Someone who’s not content to just be normal.” Then he looked over at me again. “Let’s get you home now. Where do you live?”

Home. Such a foreign term. I twisted one of my braids between my fingers, wondering if he’d be the one to understand what no one else had understood. “This is where I live,” I said, gesturing to the open air around us. “I sleep under the stars.” The stars were beautiful, spreading across the sky like speckles on the coat of a dapple gray horse.

“You sleep on the ground?”

“Most of the time. If the wolves are nearby then I’ll sleep in the trees sometimes,” I said, watching him intently, waiting for the moment where he’d tell me I needed a home and a mother and a real place to sleep.

“But you have nowhere to stay? I thought no one lived on the streets. Surely someone could take you in and­­–”

I folded my arms. “Yes, someone could. I’d rather stay out here, and I don’t live on the streets. I live outside of towns, where the grass grows wild and the wind is so strong it can blow you right over if you’re not careful.” My hands were already unfolded, gesturing away. I had been so passionate about it that I could never stay angry at anyone for long, not while I was trying to explain it to them, anyway.

“You’d rather stay outside than in a house?”

“Why not? I’ve never had a home, and I’ve never had anyone to love either. I love the grass and the trees and the sky and the stars…and that’s enough for me.”

Efron gave me a small smile. “I have a preposition for you, Riven.”

“What is it? Don’t try to make me live with someone or anything like that. I could never stand that, ever.”

“I want you to be the next Blade.” He said it straight out, without a single moment of hesitation. It was so unexpected that it caught me completely off guard. “But I’m a girl.” There had never been a Blade who was a girl, ever.

He looked me in the eyes, crouching down so we were at the exact same level, like we were equals. “But you’re not a normal girl. You’ll never be the kind of girl who will stay inside without taking a chance at a fight. You have too much fire in you for that.”

Now that we’ve read the excerpt, it’s time to form our critique, starting with the top of the oreo–some awesomeness. Usually for the first one, I choose an overall thing I liked, or a specific thing near the beginning so that the critique flows in some sort of close to chronological order. Once I choose that part, I start writing the critique around that.

I really liked it! I think it has an interesting premise and I like the interesting tidbits of world building that you show–the Blade is the name of the country’s leader! And Efron says that people will grow up to be Knives, or maybe Rapiers. I’m not exactly sure what those are but it sounds like this country is all about fighting and I think that’s super interesting.

There’s the top of the oreo, where I shared some stuff that I thought was awesome. Next comes the filling, things that could be improved. You might have noticed that throughout this post I have completely avoided using the word “bad” to describe these parts, because even if they are that, we don’t want to focus on that. We want to focus on their potential to become as awesome as the other parts, and how that could be achieved. Usually I put the biggest issue I see in the first slot…for no reason, really. It doesn’t really matter which improvement you select from the excerpt at which time, aside from the flow of the critique.

One thing I was a little confused about was why Efron chose her to be the Blade. Though I think she does make a good Blade, we hardly see any of her personality in this section, and I don’t think what she talks about would really warrant him choosing her–especially if he didn’t pick someone out of thousands of boys. I think an experience that shows her potential for fighting skill or leadership would make it more realistic.

Okay, now for the next part of the oreo, some more awesomeness on the outside. I usually try to make it relate on at least some level with the constructive criticism, so that the transition isn’t jarring.

Aside from that, I thought the parts of her personality you did show were fun. I loved getting to see Riven when she was little! Her conversation with Efron amused me, especially the fact that she felt so proud to be next to the Blade despite the fact he had just walked past a whole line of other children. I liked the style of the flashback too, how most of it was in Riven’s current voice, but the actions still conveyed younger Riven’s personality.

The fun part about this method is that you can either stop there, or it can go on forever. You can either make an oreo stack (awesome, improve, awesome, awesome, improve, awesome) or a double or triple or quadruple decker oreo sandwich (awesome, improve, awesome, improve, awesome). I just choose whichever one flows better. I’ll do a double decker for this one.

I don’t really understand why she would have lived in the wild and not wanted to have a home and a family. It seems like part of her really longs to have love and acceptance, so why not when she was younger? Also, she must have had a family at some point–she couldn’t have just grown up there. Maybe she finds this out later?

Anyway, I can tell that she does love it because of the way she describes it. The way she talks about the wind and how she compares the stars to a dapple gray horse just feels magical, and almost makes me want to drive into the middle of nowhere and have a campout. 🙂

I could continue and go more in-depth…but because of the length of this monstrosity of a post, I’m gonna stop now. Sometimes when I close, I sneak on another awesome thing I liked, but otherwise I thank them for letting me read it. It’s hard to put your own writing out there, and they deserve a thank you for their courage.

I really enjoyed getting to read this. Thank you so much for sharing it!

And…there’s the end of my critique! Thank you for reading through this ginormous post (if you made it all the way through alive, hehe) and I hope it helps you with your critiques!

What do you think? I was going to post another piece of my writing and have you practice, but I have a better idea! In the comments, post a short excerpt of writing (probably try to do no more than 300 words, since it’s just in the comments) or share a link to some of your posted writing. Then, look through the other comments and practice by giving the other commenters a short oreo critique on their writing! It shall be much fun! 😀

By my order, this week is decreed The Week of Blog Tags, in which I shall gift you with a blog tag each day (in an attempt to finish all the ones I have been tagged for). Therefore, I shall not tag anyone, else there be a multitude of tags. If you wish to be tagged, you are! Thus ends the decree.

I still feel like there’s a tag I’m missing…? But oh well. I can’t remember it so I just snatched this tag from Fin @ Spiel since she said anyone could take it. Thanks, Fin! It’s, obviously, about rising authors which sounds kinda like the zombie apocalypse with writers but I think it’s supposed to mean aspiring authors…? The really fun part is that I get to share a 150 word piece/excerpt of my writing! (Now I just have to choose which excerpt to post…)

Rules:
1. Write a post thanking the person who tagged you: include the tag, the 11 questions asked, your answers, and, in reply to the request for a small piece of prose or poetry, share a 150-word story.
2. At the end of the post, provide 11 new questions.
3. Request a brief 150-word story from the people you tagged.
4. Tag at least one person, and include a link to their blog.

Q&A with Fin:

What’s your favourite genre to write in?

Fantasy is what I’ve written from the beginning, but I’m working on an epic science fiction series right now, and I’m really liking it so far, so I like that too. I’ve also always wanted to write a fractured fairy tale (which I suppose could fall under fantasy) but have never actually finished one.

What are your favourite writing blogs, or writing websites?

My favorite writing website is definitely the Young Writers Program for NaNoWriMo–everyone is so friendly and awesome, and participating in NaNoWriMo is just awesome in general.

Give three pieces of writing advice that you’ve found helpful!

Ooh, hmm… 1. Have fun with your first draft and don’t worry about it making sense–just make sure to love it. 2. A good ramble about your own writing never hurt anyone, and can actually be really helpful. 3. Chocolate always helps.

Do you listen to music when you write? If so, what do you like to listen to? If not, well, why not?

Yes, if I remember to turn it on, haha. I usually listen to “epic music” on youtube, which can alternately be non-distracting background music or an inspiring fountain of story ideas.

Do you eat or drink while you write? If so, what do you eat/drink?

Hmm, not usually, actually. When I procrastinate from writing, though, that’s when all the chocolate and candy and random snacks come out…

Out of curiosity, what’s your typing speed?

I’m not sure; I haven’t taken a typing speed test in a while. I think generally my typing speed if I’m going as fast as possible is about 70 wpm, but when I’m writing it’s a lot less because I have to think. I think if I’m writing as fast as possible I can get to around 500 words in 15 minutes, which is about…33 wpm. And that’s when I’m trying to go fast.

Do you give much thought to your antagonist?

I haven’t really, before, but I’m planning on digging down deep into my antagonist for Enhanced (and hopefully, into all my other characters). I want him to be a realistic antagonist, so I’ll have to work on him for a while.

Do you write more females or more males?

Probably more females… I try to balance it out but I think I just end up with more females because I’m female and that’s who’s easier.

Which do you think you write better?

Females, definitely. I don’t feel like I have enough deep friendships with boys to be able to write them properly.

What’s your idea of a perfect place and time to write?

Ooh, interesting question. I don’t know, usually I just sit on my couch when I write, which is fine, and I think it’d be weird to write anywhere else now since I hardly ever do. And a perfect time? I actually tend to stay up late writing, but I don’t like it. I’d rather write earlier in the day when I’m better at thinking and will actually be able to get a decent amount of sleep that night.

If you could do one thing to make your writing life easier, what would it be?

I’m not really sure. I think part of the fun and reward of writing is the challenge of it. I mean, having no procrastination would make my writing life so much easier…but I think it makes me feel closer to my novels when I realize how much time and effort I’ve spent on them. Yeah, I don’t know…maybe I’d just tone down the procrastination a bit.

Writing Excerpt:

Since I was too lazy to actually write something new for this, and didn’t want to use something from the old Enhanced, I decided to take an excerpt of an excerpt I wrote for these writing practice things I was trying to do months ago. It’s the end of a conversation (well, argument) between Kai and Taira, and I doubt it’ll even go anywhere in any of the novels, but I like it, so I’ll stick it in here. (Oh, and feedback is always appreciated!)

Each of her words cut, and with them, a desire to cut her back burning stronger and stronger. “You’re the one who’s being insulting. You may have gone through some pretty terrible things, but that doesn’t mean you have to be rude to everyone else about it! You have a choice—a choice to be whoever you want to be, and you just chose to be bitter about it.”

Taira turned a cold glare back at him, but in those eyes, he could see the pain that he’d inflicted. She was hurting too, now. “You have no idea what I’ve been through. So you can just go now. I can’t believe I even started talking to you in the first place.”

His heart pumped, pulsing against the wounds she’d caused, blood spilling through him. Guilt pumping through his bloodstream. Realization pooling around him.

She didn’t hurt any less than he did.

But it was too late to say he was sorry now.

Questions:

When did you first start writing, and was there ever any real reason why?

What is your goal as an author?

What writing project are you working on right now? What is it about? (Extensive rambling is highly encouraged.)

What new plot bunnies have you had recently?

Do you prefer wide-ruled or college-ruled notebooks? Trust me, this is a very important question.

Is there any specific kind of pen or pencil that you like to write with the best when you’re writing on paper?

Since this is the Rising Authors Tag, what heights have you risen to in your writing that you never thought you would? Also, have you ever been a zombie?

How many books do you read on average in a month?

Would you rather write a first draft, or revise one?

Do you have any writing rituals?

Do you ever put inside jokes or easter eggs in your writing? Tell us about them! Give us all your secrets…

Remember, if you want to be tagged, you are! If any of you do this tag, I’d love it if you’d post a link in the comments so I can read it! If you don’t, you should totally answer the questions in the comments. Especially the zombie one.

Hi! I’m Lana, a young writer, singer, and Christian, as well as a couple of other things. I’ve been reading and writing since as long as I can remember, and I love to write novels and other such writing-y things.